


Atlas

by grizzly_bear_bane



Series: Cigar Box [18]
Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: First Meetings, Gang Violence, Homelessness, Homophobic Language, Implied/Referenced Underage Prostitution, Prompt Fill, Prostitution, Sexist Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-07
Updated: 2015-04-07
Packaged: 2018-03-21 15:55:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3698183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grizzly_bear_bane/pseuds/grizzly_bear_bane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arthur’s first few nights out on his own after running away aren’t going so well. </p><p>Thank God there’s Mal, his knight in shining stiletto heels.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Atlas

**Author's Note:**

  * For [velificatio](https://archiveofourown.org/users/velificatio/gifts).



> Thanks for the prompt meme! <3
> 
> Enjoy!

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At twelve, there’s only one person that Arthur trusts to ask this to:

“Are fairy tales real, Mal?”

He’s been thinking about it for a long time now. He remembers his dad beating his mother for even letting him watch Sleeping Beauty with her. And at David’s, he was bullied mercilessly the first and last time he’d been dumb enough to come to David’s bed and ask for a bedtime story when he was first brought to his house.

“No,  _mon ange_ ,” she says, leaning against a pub, her comically tall heels digging holes into the pavement. The smoke from her thin cigarette curls in the air like magic. “In some other world, perhaps, there are happy endings, but... not for us.”

She shoos him away but not far when a car pulls up. 

“That your kid?” The man asks, taking her small wrist in his big hand. Arthur wants to run when he sees  _that look_  in the man’s eyes, but he’s been following Mal like a duckling for three days now. There’s a cop still looking for him. The bruises on his wrists haven’t even begun to fade. No way is he going at the streets alone.

Especially now that he’s found her.

Arthur’s not completely sure just who Mal is yet, in  _their_  fairytale. There are so many dragons in this world, maybe she’s a queen or princess, and this alley and the wall is her tower. The dragon keeping her captive comes on her fishnet-covered thigh, sighing. His arms keep her caged in as he catches his breath, watching her pull her tight dress back over her breasts and yank the hem down to cover her where underwear should have been. Arthur knows he’s not supposed to look. If his aunt where here, she’d flip, but... Mal is so beautiful with her accent and her figure and her nakedness.

There’s no way Arthur’s her Prince Charming, though. He’s not even as tall as her shoulders, and probably weighs as much as one of her long legs.

“So,” the dragon says, taking the liberty to stuff his money in Mal’s bra himself, “how much for your little friend? I got a few buddies who might like a party pet his size.”

Mal’s glare is like a gun pointed at the john’s face, unafraid and unamused, even as he laughs, adjusting himself. She leans her back against the wall, smiling, but Arthur knows her real smile and this isn’t it. She’s chuckling as she reaches into her dress and pulls out a knife.

It’s at the man’s neck in the blink of an eye. She’s got him by the collar, the gang brand tattoo on her hands look like black and grey smudges in the streetlights. Her heels click on the pavement as she forces the man by the knife to step back, away from Arthur.

“It would be in your best interest to forget that you ever saw him,” she warns, gritted through her teeth. She’s like a lioness. “Fuck off, you pig-faced creep.”

She’s  _Arthur’s_  Prince Phillip, his Prince Charming. With her tight, little dress as her knight’s armor, her heels are boots that have traveled the world, with her tiny knife more powerful than a sword.

The dragon roars, breathing fire through insults, but flees, his full wallet in Mal’s hand now.

She tosses it at Arthur as if she’s Robin Hood but sighs at the boys whistling at her from the other end of the alley. 

Arthur knows to steer clear of her now. He’s a small as a sneeze so he wedges himself behind a dumpster as Mal struts slowly towards the approaching boys. They’re not her Merry Men. Dwarves, perhaps as she towers over all of them in height, but they’re mean. Very mean, like David’s boys.

“Oscar, honey, boys,” Mal says, a smile in her voice, but her shoulders and bare back are tense. She digs the money out of her bra when they reach her, not even sparing the tip for herself. 

The shortest one, maybe just a few years older than him, the one Arthur remembers yelling at him on his first night away from David’s, speaks in a way that drives Arthur nuts as he makes a show of counting the bills. “Good work, girl.” As if he owns her. “Who was that kid?” It kills Arthur, because in truth, Oscar, these boys, and all the others who run the gang, who put those brands and that bandana on Mal,  _do_  own her.

She laughs, and to Arthur it’s a sound like his mother and aunt’s, soothing, a fairytale itself for the comfort and hope that it can bring. “Oscar, baby, he is nothing. A lost boy looking for his way home.”

“At what? One in the morning?” The boys’ laughter scares the breath from Arthur. 

Oscar’s fist in Mal’s stomach rips the breath from her. “You fucking lying bitch!” 

She grunts, collapsing from her heels.

Arthur might as well have travelled back in time, but this isn’t his tall father and his short mother. This isn’t Arthur at nine, or eight, or even four, hiding in the closet with his little dinosaurs. 

Twelve isn’t a giant leap in age for how small he still is, but he’s not that kid anymore. This isn’t a fairytale. If Mal’s hurting, and there’s no magical sleep or kiss that can take it away... but he’s not a dragon or a hyena with a pack like these boys. He isn’t tall or strong or even... brave. 

He’s not her prince. He’s just Arthur. “Stop!”

“Arthur, no!” 

The boys corner him at once, but he’s already pushing the wallet at them. “Take it! It’s all I got, I swear. Just leave her alone. Please.” 

Oscar whistles, leafing through the money and cards. “You think you can buy her with this?”

“No! I just...” He understands the mistake he’s made, why Mal’s been keeping him hidden by the look he’s given. Backing away won’t get those eyes off him. Begging just makes that stare more terrifying. 

Oscar’s looking for Arthur’s brands and sees none. “Who you work for, ‘Arthur’?”

“Ah... N-nobody.”

“Fuck yeah, fresh meat!”

“No,” Mal shouts, cringing though it’s Arthur whose arm is getting bruised in Oscar’s grip. “He’s a runaway.”

“Ain’t all of you runaway?”

“ _From the police!_  They’ve been looking for him for days. He will only give you trouble.”

Those words only earn Mal more pain. 

“Then why the hell are you babysitting this little faggot, huh?” Oscar’s held back by the other boys before he can do more damage. He points down at her with rage. “Dumb bitch.” He turns on Arthur, his young face twisted in disgust when he hits him. “If I see you again, you’re dead. Stay the fuck away from my property.”

He points to Mal again. “Clean up and get back to work.”

“Of course,” Mal says to his feet, her thin arm wrapped around her stomach like a bandage, the other held out like a flag of surrender. “I’m sorry. 

Arthur’s rushing to her the second the boys are gone. Her stockings are ripped and her lip is red with blood. For a second, he sees his mother. He panics. “Should I call someone? I can call the police and hide until you get back, or-or... do you need water? I have bandaids.” 

“Just you. Come here.” 

He hurries to curl up under her arms, the words tumbling out of his mouth with his sobs. “I’m so sorry!”

“No, no. It’s okay. Are  _you_  hurt?” Her hands are steady as she wipes away his tears. “Don’t be frightened. I’m alright. You were so valiant for me...my little prince.” Seeing Arthur try to clean the gravel away from her scraped knee, her face loses it’s wall of courage. Her sob breaks free. “I’m so sorry, Arthur, but it’s not safe for you to stay with me.”

“No! I-I’m sorry, Mal! I’ll do better! I’ll stay out of your way. Please don’t get rid of me! I won’t get you in trouble again. I promise!”

“I can’t sneak you in. They’ll be watching me too closely now. They will kill you or  _worse_. I won’t let them trap you.”

“But I’ll die out here!” He hurries to his feet with her, quick to catch her when she stumbles. 

She snatches off her heels and tosses them at the opposite wall, all her regal beauty and magic gone. Her eyes close, her breath deep as she composes herself, like a shapeshifter. She breaths deeply again before turning to him, her hands gripping his shoulders tight, her forehead pressed to his. “Arthur, listen to me,  _mon ange_ , you must listen." 

He hears none of her words, his mind already back to the cop, to David, to the johns he’s already had. He shakes with his sobs, covering his face. “I’m not cut out for this, Mal, I don’t want to be here. I want my mom!”

“I know, bébé. You don’t belong in this toxic world, but... you can’t give up. You have me!”

“I won’t make it. It’s impossible.”

“Nothing is impossible, Arthur. You are stronger than you think. And you’re smart. If I take you with me tonight, they will brand you and sell you away to some gang in some other city to people who deal in trading boys. I would never see you again, and you could  _never_  escape them. I’m stuck here, but you don’t have to be. You can make your own way. When things settle again, it might be safe to sneak you to the house, but not until then, okay?”

“What am I supposed to do? What if they hurt you again?” He clutches her hand. “We could run away together!”

“No. If I run, I die. Besides, what I make is theirs, and you have twenty dollars to your name. You need that to eat. That man you ran from starved you.” 

“Mal,” he tries again, his voice cracking, weak, “I’m going to die, aren’t I?”

“Not if you’re smart, and I know you are.”

“You don’t have to lie. I don’t have anywhere to hide. I’m going to die.”

“No. You will survive. Think of all you have survived thus far. You see these bruises? These scrapes?” She holds his chin when he tries to look away from her. “This is nothing. I have suffered worse, and I will not let this stop me. I will keep you safe, at all cost. If that means leaving you tonight, then I will do this. The sun rises in a few hours. We’ve have that time together. When the sunsets again tomorrow, you will meet me here, and you will be very much alive, because I forbid you to give up. Now, promise me. You will be here tomorrow for me?”

Arthur wipes his face, feeling every bit like an ant, even to Mal as he looks up passed her to the unreachable sky. “I don’t know.”

She grips his arms like his mother used to as she adds weight to her words. “Say ‘yes, you will be here.’”

He can only think of the terrors these streets will bring him the moment he’s no longer in her sight, but he loves her. No way will he let Mal down. “O-okay.”

“Okay,” she breathes. “That’s good enough for now, I think.” She takes his hand, kissing it, her smile pained, the blood mixed with her lipstick. “Come on, my sweet darling. Let’s enjoy the night before the sun catches us. We’ll go visit our sisters. But first,” she picks her little purse up off the ground with a wince and hands Arthur her shoes to told as she digs into her purse, “I need to put on a pretty face.”

More of her armor, Arthur thinks sadly, but he’s never met the other princesses and knights in this realm like Mal. 

“Don’t be so nervous,  _mon ange_. You’re charming. They will love you as I do.”

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**End.**

**Author's Note:**

> For more drabble requests, questions, inspiration pics, and updates for this fic series, go to grizzly-bear-bane.tumblr.com/
> 
> [tag: vertebrae verse]


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